


In the Black

by Dantalionax



Category: Vampyr (Video Game)
Genre: Complete, Gen, Human McCullum, M/M, Turned Swansea, based on art, slash in the eye of the beholder
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-28
Updated: 2018-07-28
Packaged: 2019-06-17 13:43:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,746
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15462669
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dantalionax/pseuds/Dantalionax
Summary: "I am indebted to you for sparing me at Pembroke, but this won't always be the case", It never had sat well with McCullum, owing a leech a favor like that, but he was able to set it aside in the twilight nights of the epidemic.Until one patrol finds him face-to-face with a chance to tie off that loose end for good.





	In the Black

**Author's Note:**

> Based on fan art found @ http://krispytin.tumblr.com/post/175703254375/oh-god-vampyr-art-requests-i-just-beat-it-and-i

It was a frigid, snowy night in December when McCullum had drawn the short straw for patrol again.

That meant he got to take the twins. Again.

Fuck.

You couldn't fault Henry or Robert's enthusiasm. Unfortunately, that was all they had going for them. Thick as manure and half as useful. They had friends in high places, though, so they had to be tolerated. It would remain to see if their infatuation and exuberance would survive an actual encounter with a Leech of any sort. Patrols had finally become that quiet.

It was bizarre to admit that barely a month ago the Guard was killing hundreds of them a night. He twiddled away at the hilt of a new dagger he'd received and been unable to test. Their weaponsmaster had managed to plate the blade with orichalcum, somehow, and theorized it would burn the beasts like it were made of sunlight.

McCullum had his doubts about the efficacy, though it was still a good weapon regardless of what it was plated in. Their route had taken them along the Thames, still ranting and roaring its way through London as it always did. The twins, in a surprising feat for their memories had already dashed down the staircases to the water level. They darted in and out of the hovels and sewer accesses, laughing and bellowing, brandishing their torches and clubs with the zeal of men who truly had no idea what could be lurking down there. It left McCullum to gaze across the water at the silhouette of Pembroke Hospital. The Great War was over and the Skal epidemic, it seemed, was drawing to a close but the flu still raged. It continued to reap its backwards toll, strangling the young and strong while leaving the old and feeble. Pembroke had an advantage in the fight, hive of Leech activity that it was. They had been fortunate to not have many deaths among their staff, and McCullum knew one name in particular that would never be printed among the deceased.

He had not spoken to anyone about his encounter with the Leech known as Doctor Jonathan Reid. McCullum had not been in any condition to carry out the Guard's justice at the end of their prior meeting in Pembroke, at any rate. No, despite his best plans, choice of weapons and arena, McCullum fell to the floor all the same. It was only for an instant, but he knew better than near any man in London that's all a Leech needed. The fall was a suffocating blur of fear and pain where he braced for a final blow.

"There is no escape, Leech. Kill me now, for there is no way you can sway me to your ideals!" He had demanded, a silly thing from his disarmed and bloodied state. Would he even hear the gunshot? Would he feel the blade in his back?

Instead, he only felt the cold of the man's shadow. A powerful hand grabbed him by the jaw, forcing his face up. "That's where you're mistaken", the Leech said all too calmly in that purring, resonant baritone of his. Gazing up into Reid's dispassionate blue eyes, the realization hit him harder than any of the man's physical blows had.

There was something far, far worse than mere mortal death at hand here. The rotting floorboards splintered and squealed as his fingers raked gouges into them. "What do you mean?" Dawning horror had coiled around McCullum's throat, choking away his pride and bravery to a trembling whisper. If the Leech bothered to answer, he didn't hear it. Primal fight or flight had torn him away below the surface into a world populated only by his frenzied, panicked heartbeat and the implacable fingers grasping his face. They stretched and twined at his throat, pressing in on the rippling artery found there. He wanted to run, but knew it would make no difference. The cat had caught the mouse. Better to meet fate here with dignity instead of providing the monster more twisted entertainment by fleeing.

The strike never came. Instead, he found himself helped to his feet by the same steady hand that threatened to snap his neck a moment before. Relief pounded through him so ferociously his head spun. It took all he had left not to faint, swooning into the all-too-obviously waiting arms like some medieval damsel. That was clearly what the Leech had intended, but he had underestimated McCullum's strength. He shook and staggered, wobbled and even drooled a little in his punch drunk mire: but he was standing. Still with enough fervor in him to hurl threats at the Leech that dared walk away.

McCullum had spent the next week licking his wounds on bed rest. Nobody dared question the story he gave about Lord so-and-so from Ascalon ambushing him. Nobody was around at night, either, when he'd been reduced to looking in closets like a scared child. Every night he waited to see those blue, blue eyes glinting out of the shadows, coming to finish him off.

They never appeared, and it took a chance encounter in the cemetery to put those fears to rest. Reid had spared him, with no treachery involved. The man had left with King Arthur's blood in tow, and that was the last McCullum had seen of him. Apparently, the doctor's plan had succeeded since the very night after the number of new Skals reported dropped dramatically. The Guard was finally able to turn back the tide and if it weren't for the flu, London's streets would be as safe as they ever were.

"Oh God! Oh G-g-g-g-god! Boss! BOSS!" Henry (or Robert) shrieked. The piercing register could have broken glass and shattered McCullum's expectation of a quiet night as easy as it set every dog in the district howling. The boys were up the road from him, peeking into an alley. One was rooted in place, slack-jawed in his own torchlight. The other had clearly seen all he could take and vomited before he staggered away. McCullum ran up at full tilt. Despite his experience, he wasn't still wasn't ready for the smell because he knew exactly what it was.

Leech blood. Leech blood, sickly sweet, mixed with the foulness he'd never met outside of an abattoir. The alley certainly looked the part of a slaughterhouse. A man, nearly split in two at the middle was face down in looping viscera and blood. His hand was still clutching a rusted woodsman's axe that had clearly met its mark. Whatever leech he had struck, he struck hard in some artery. There was a spray of dark blood that had shot about one wall, down to the ground, across the kid and up the other ---

The kid? A little boy. Spattered in gore, shivering in fear and cold crouched in the shadows. Completely silent with tear tracks on his face, still brandishing a pocketknife at McCullum through the snowflakes.

"Son?" He couldn't be more than 8, McCullum thought as he held up his palms and knelt. "Son. Are you injured?" McCullum said, calm and slow. The kid shook his head. "You are fortunate. I can help you, but you'll need to put that blade down first." He shook his head again and tried to scramble backwards, tripping and falling into some debris. All the same, he did drop the knife. McCullum picked it up and folded the edge away, then held it out to the child.

"My name is Geoffrey McCullum, these two are Henry and Robert. We do not want to hurt you. What happened?" The kid snatched the knife back in a blink, clutching it to his chest in both hands like a stuffed toy.

"I'm... I'm Ch-ch-charlie, sir... This fancy sod, sir, I was pick 'is pockets and me Pa..." Charlie glanced at the body and tears welled up. "Pa was gonna rough 'im up a little, near took 'is 'ed off wiv the axe... sir, sir I'm s-s-orry sir... I could nae get his wallet, it was a demon... so fast... too fast!" He broke into incoherent sobs. It was all McCullum needed.

"Henry. You take Charlie home." Henry had been the one vomiting. It had purged the backtalk out as well because there were no smart remarks, just a mumble and small nod. "Robert, with me." Hunt alone, die alone, McCullum had been taught well.

That didn't mean he would wait for the rookie. The leech was bleeding so heavily that anyone else in the Guard would have assumed it was already dead. Not him, though. None had his dedication or thoroughness. He sprung up the scaffold at the end of the alleyway, skipping rungs on the ladder and dropping down on the other side. The snow made it too easy to track the beast, neatly highlighting every blood splatter and footprint. Already, he could see the trail stopped before the narrow side street did in a red and gray heap.

It was not moving, but McCullum stopped short and drew the new dagger. They're clever things, and he knew never to assume one was really inert until it had been burned. Something wasn't quite right here. Too small to be a Skal. He prowled a little closer. It was a man.

A familiar man in a familiar gray coat.

Reid. White hot anger burst within McCullum. He roared and surged forward, grabbing up fistful of dark hair and roughly wrenching Reid's head up to face him. McCullum wanted the Leech to know it was him and to see fear in its eyes as it died.

But he found no fear there. Reid blinked slowly with a delirious smile. He tried to sit up but couldn't seem to manage it. The axe certainly had done its job. It had gouged deeply into Reid's shoulder, cleaving through collarbone, ribs and god-knows what else. The blow could have split his skull and was probably the man's intent but it seemed he had fatally underestimated his opponent. Reid was absolutely soaked down with his own blood though the bleeding had slowed. Instead of the pressurized spurt McCullum had seen evidence of in the alley before it had tapered to a feeble drip, sprinkling away in little beads on the cobblestone.

"Vampire hunter...?" Reid wheezed. He stretched his neck out, trying to focus his faltering sight on the man above him. All he managed was to present a corded, pale arc of his flesh to McCullum before he went limp in his grasp again. He brought the dagger howling in, making a shimmering crescent through the frigid air.

It all stopped short right before scraping to a squealing halt on the pavement stones. The blade was a hair from Reid's neck, stuck firm between two stones. All the training, all the experience, and he could not force the knife any further to finish his job. For he was no longer putting a dangerous predator down. It was just a man, unconscious, perhaps even dying and completely at his mercy. Angry at his sudden burst of compassion, he threw the dagger and heard it splash down in the river. But what to do now?

"Boss? Boss!" Robert had finally caught up but remained too dense to simply follow along the blood trail. McCullum stood up, blocking the view from the joining street. "Here, boy." It was far simpler to call the twins like dogs when he needed results and sure enough, Robert appeared.

"It's been dealt with. Go home, boy. Burning flesh is a smell you can never forget." The excitement had worn the other twin out as well. He tried to peek behind McCullum but all it took was a raised arm and sharp glare to ward him off. Robert shrugged and jogged off, back down the lane and out of sight.

Reid was well and fully silent and somehow even paler than normal. Lips blanched to a faded veal pink and skin gone to bone china with all its eerie, waxy translucense. McCullum had seen bodies dredged up after months in the Thames that looked more alive. Though he knew better, he worried for a moment that the man was truly gone. He knelt beside the body and placed his fingers on Reid's neck, in a mirror to where Reid's hands had been those weeks prior.

It was there. Faint and fluttering, sure, but a pulse all the same. He sighed and looked to the sky for some sort of celestial validation. No gods were found there, just more snow. He draped Reid's uninjured arm over his shoulder and put one of his around the man's back, and attempted to stand.  
This would have ended in success, had Reid not been very near the same height as he. Instead, the other man's full dead weight slumped over onto McCullum and without the good sense to let go, sent him crashing to the ground in a confusing wet tangle of limbs and soggy overcoats.  
Saint Christopher didn't have to put up with this shit, he thought. That would do the trick, though. Just as he'd seen painted on a cathedral fresco somewhere, he hooked Reid's legs behind the knees and let his body fall forward onto his back. He realized, then, he should have been terrified. He'd seen Leeches regenerate right before his eyes, all by feeding. Gulping down chunks of rotten flesh to resprout limbs. Siphoning away mouthfuls of blood and healing buckshot wounds. Yet here he was, feeling little motes of warm breath from one grazing his neck. Unafraid. Androcles had not feared the lion, so Geoffrey would not fear the leech. Sidelong, he looked at Reid, grumbling. "I know that I'm indebted to you and all, but I never thought I would pay you back this soon."

He glanced at Pembroke, mentally plotting a course, then trotted off into the night. All that was left behind him were some smeary boot prints, quickly fading under fresh powder.

 

* * *

 

Jonathan Reid awoke to a trio of unpleasant sensations. Firstly, his mouth had gone so dry it had managed to make his teeth throb. Secondly, he was sore like he'd taken a stomp or twenty from a Percheron. Thirdly, right in the epicenter of that all soreness, he was being poked.

Palpated, even. He didn't even need to open his eyes to know who it was. Nobody else in the city reeked of phenol and cloves like that.

"Edgar, what the hell are you doing?" Reid said to no acknowledgment.

"Fascinating, simply fascinating..." Doctor Swansea said in a hushed tone. He hadn't noticed Reid staring up at him and continued on taking down notes. Eventually he set the chart aside and moved to return to prodding at the healing injury.

Reid intercepted that annoyance, grabbing Swansea by the wrist. He yelped and tried to jump away, staggering off-balance. He would have fallen over, but Reid's hold remained firm and steady.

"Touch skittish tonight, are we doctor?" Reid said, dryly. Swansea straightened his glasses and smiled brightly down at him. "Ah, Jonathan! Good to have you back among the...well, un-living, as it were, my friend." He said.

"How long?" Reid tried to sit up but was quickly laid back down by a bright flare of pain across his shoulder. He was on a cot in Swansea's office, denuded to the waist. Though his injuries had not been sutured or bandaged, they had been cleaned. Streaks of red-orange rolled across pale flesh, demarcating the full nature of his wounds. The old grandfather clock struck two, and even with a spindly network of frost obscuring the window panes Reid could tell clearly it meant the one at night. Swansea exhaled heavily, releasing the type of tension into the room that was usually found tied up in fault lines. Here, there was no earthquake to follow, just a smaller man placing a smaller hand on Reid's and speaking quietly. "It's never been a physician's purview to worry about the exact circumstances of the malady we are treating, but please, be a little more careful. Had that blade veered a half-inch farther and found your heart... I don't know that you'd have come back from that." He withdrew his hand and sat quiet for a moment before walking back to his desk, peering over at the date dial on the clock.

"Better part of three days, I'm afraid. You were in such poor shape when you were brought in I didn't question your, erm, company at all." Swansea snorted and shook his head. "The deviance of some men! Probably all part of a plan or something." Agitated, he started pacing about on a well-worn path in front of his desk. The carpet was not entirely threadbare but was certainly on its way and a decade of anxious, scuttling footsteps had not been kind to the polish on the wood to either side.

A little more gingerly, Reid pulled himself upright. The ribs that had shattered had knit together, but were still tender and felt quite delicate. A gnawing, dull pain bit at Reid in the bottom of his breaths. Healing was not a free ride, and for a moment, Reid waxed nostalgic for his human days. Painkillers worked. Now, through some quirk of his new biology he had already shrugged off an amount of antifebrin that should have left him cyanotic and thrashing in seizure. Even the kind of morphine dosage that would sedate a bull elephant had failed to take the edge off.

"Company? What?" He said, rubbing the days of torpor out of his eyes. The last he could remember clearly was the rather slippery sensation of his claws slashing through flesh in an angry, savage haze. "Slow down, Edgar, how did I get here?"

"McCullum! Geoffrey McCullum! Back in my hospital!" Swansea whined, dramatically rubbing at his temples before clenching his fists and visibly shuddering. He fell quiet once more and leaned against his desk with a terribly haunted look in his eyes. "I heard you cry out, in my head. I was already fearing the worst from that. Then that man, that dreadful man appeared with your body draped about his shoulders like a damned hunting trophy. I thought he had come for me. I know I said I'd flee if the guard came but I saw no sense in prolonging it. I'm certainly not the fighter you are, Jonathan."

"Instead of drawing a weapon he held his hands up for a moment and set you down. Looked me dead in the eye, and said 'You're still a doctor, aren't you, or are you just another leech now? Help him, damnit!' Ah, I just had the carpet cleaned..." He shook his head and gestured at the ground. Sure enough, there was a new rusty arc on the floor, only partially camouflaged in the maroon of the carpet. At this point, Reid had come to expect more blood on the floor in this office than in their rather disused operating theater but was still not terribly comfortable with what this splotch signified.

"He simply posted up in the corner and watched. Must have gone round that rosary fifty times, if I didn't know better, I'd say he was worried. Spitting image of a father-to-be awaiting his firstborn... Fortunately, your body is quite magnificent!" Swansea said, a little over-enthusiastic before pausing to recollect himself. "That is to say, I suppose you were out of danger by sunup. Oh, I am quite pleased to report that transfusion technique worked flawlessly! I've collected more data on Ekon regeneration than the Brotherhood's had in a century!" The man was beaming again as he rushed about the room, waving papers, babbling about discoveries, new theories and their requisite experiments...

"Edgar, please. Tomorrow night." Reid had to stop him. It felt like scolding a puppy but Reid knew better than anyone else at Pembroke that Swansea would keep going til the sun came up if he didn't. When he stood to leave he staggered under the unpleasant whorl of a head rush, all racing heart and trembling hands from a body trying to function with not nearly enough blood in it. Swansea seemed to notice, but Reid waved off his concern and padded softly to the door. He paused for a moment with his hand on the latch.

"Thank you, Edgar. I don't know what McCullum was thinking but had I been able I certainly would not have allowed him to bring me here." He said. Swansea was already back behind his desk, plucking a pencil from the orbit of that skull he kept there.

"Nonsense, Jonathan. I would have it no other way, I learned so, so much! Now go, get some rest." Swansea shooed him away, already absorbed in his work.

Reid stood in the hallway outside, baffled. It was a short walk back to his own office, thankfully, but it still left more than enough time for thoughts. Geoffrey McCullum carried him home. The entire concept beggared belief. The de facto head of the Guard of Priwen had stumbled across a vampire he'd sworn to kill and not only decided not against it, he brought him to safety instead. Swansea lying about the scenario seemed equally absurd. Perhaps it was some sort of plot to steal his research, though the Guard would be woefully disappointed with it. Reid had busied himself in entirely mundane work since he returned to London. Swansea had said McCullum had spent the entire night with him, so he must have simply bided his time before he went to ransack Reid's office. It was all he could fathom, even with some foggy, vague memories he hadn't disclosed to Swansea earlier. An angry spray of arterial blood. Anxious flight, desperate to reach safety. Confusion, panic, and collapse in a snowy street. A rough hand, grasping his hair. Deep blue eyes, glaring down at him. First consumed in malice, then softening, gentled with kindness. A blurry Irishman's tenor voice, and a sensation of being lifted.

When Reid stepped into his office, all was as he had left it, from a substance re-crystallizing on his lab bench to a now dusty glass of water at his bedside.

The only new addition: On the floor in front of him, there was a note in oddly pristine penmanship only smudged with the writer's haste.  
"We're even, ~~leech~~ Reid. -GM"  
He picked it up, remembering the graveyard, and he smiled.

**Author's Note:**

> is it mcreid? is it swanreid? You be the judge, dear reader.


End file.
